Many of Britain's major racecourses are risking a dispute with the racing press and other media outlets over a plan to charge a fee for day-of-race data such as the distances between horses at the end of a race. The scheme, introduced with little warning at the beginning of January, is being firmly resisted by the Racing Post, the sport's daily newspaper, which refuses to set a precedent by paying for information that has, according to the paper's editor, Bruce Millington, "been freely available for at least 200 years".

The plan to charge for day-of-race data has been devised by Racecourse Media Group, the holding company which manages the media rights of all Britain's major tracks with the exception of Ascot. Since 1 January, RMG's tracks have been told that information on the "judge's slip", such as the distances between beaten horses, is not for general distribution in the racecourse press room.

Instead, the information is to be passed solely to the Press Association, which has a licence to use it, and the Post has been told that it will also need to pay if it wants the same access. The PA could also decide to add an additional fee to the price it charges other media companies for its service to cover the data.

"The wider issue is that it is just not particularly clever in terms of boosting racing's appeal," Millington said yesterday. "We've been invited to have discussions with RMG over some sort of payment and they have told the relevant courses that they're not to pass on the information on the slips to the press.

"When it first started, I think a lot of the friendlier courses were ignoring the instruction, but last week it seems that the word went round and a lot of them have been very apologetic about it, but they are telling us we can't have the information.

"It seems very short-sighted. It's a classic example of one part of racing trying to get a slightly bigger slice of the cake, regardless of how big the cake actually is, or what it might mean in a wider sense."

The scheme has echoes of an attempt in 2002 by racing's former governing body, the British Horseracing Board, to charge newspapers hundreds of thousands of pounds to print racecards. The plan, which was universally resisted and derided by tabloids and broadsheets alike, was swiftly abandoned.

In a statement last night, Richard FitzGerald, the chief executive of Racecourse Media Group, said that RMG has "no problem with written press using the 'official' information for journalistic reasons".

FitzGerald added: "What we are doing is tightening up on members in the press room, who are using the information to collect data, which can then be provided to unlicensed commercial services.

"We have only received one complaint direct. We have asked what they do with the information and are still awaiting a response. Most organisations who bet, or receive raceday data, have entered into a licence, so we are just trying to be fair by applying this across the board."